Henway writes "Google is adding the option to Google Maps to
place your whereabouts either via cell phone towers or GPS. Think 'locator beacon.' Paraphrased: This would be good for people wanting to let their friends know where they are or for parents wanting to know where their children are at all times."
But does it tell you who she is with? Now if you were tracking your best friend AND your wife, you'd know why those things listed in your account statement never show up at your house.
by Anonymous Coward
on Wednesday February 04 2009, @04:38PM (#26730035)
"if you were tracking your best friend"... and in time, if most people tracked their best friends (and family), then Google would literally have the power of Big Brother to monitor the movements of almost everyone. Sounds exactly like they want to play the six degrees of separation game.
This also sounds like a dream come true for the world's governments (who do get data from Google). (Plus even if it just grew over a few years until it was say 10% of the population they tracked, there is huge statistical value in approximating the movements of that many people).
But anyone signing up to this or signing up their friends better be careful they don't visit any part of a city while a government protest is going on (or even visit the home of someone who was at a government protest, or even visit someone who was friends with someone who was at a protest).
People in power get into power because they seek power over others and they are constantly seeking ways to gain power and influence over others. (Their greatest fear is the loss of power and they spend sometimes decades learning how to gain power and influence over others). The simply act of seeking power over someone else is to seek to dictate terms to that person. That is why democracy is constantly undermined and why democracy has to be defended by each generation. Just because we have democracy now doesn't mean we keep democracy as there are people who seek to undermine it for their own gain. Ironically it is the very nature of seeking power over others that undermines democracy. So they end up distorting the society they control out of all proportion until their minority in power can control, manipulate and dictate whatever they want for their own gain.
People in power don't care about individuals but they do care about controlling and manipulating groups of people (as groups of people can stand against governments points of view). But before they can manipulate and influence a group, they need to profile everyone into groups, to then know how and where best to apply their influence. Ultimately they wish to play a divide and conquer game to undermine any group which can stand in the way of their goals. So they end up continuing to bias laws and controls in their favor, until the society they control is a nightmare vision for the majority of people in their control.
Knowledge is power and this new move by Google is a level of power way beyond the capabilities of any government in history. If the majority of people fail to learn from the mistakes of the past, we are all doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past. Knowledge is power and people who seek power see a book like 1984 as something that is good, as they are the ones who seek to control and use that level of power over others for their own gain. The people who seek such power never see their own actions as wrong, as they are too busy seeking power over others and ignoring anyone who suggests they cannot have ever more power.
We all need to stand up and speak out against moves like this before the level of control is so great that no one can speak out, for fear of what the people in power will be able to do to anyone standing up and speaking out. Democracy has to be defended by each generation and the more this level of power grows, the more we are all going to be forced by their actions to stand up and speak out against the ones who seek such power over everyone.
...it could just be that Google can see the increase hits inherent in this plan, and therefore the increased ad revenue.
And if they happen to deliver an ad (for 50 cents off, mayhap) to you for the doughnut shop you are walking past, well that's just frosting (or glaze... or SPRINKLES, ahhhhh) on the cake of life.
Really, if some ominous "they" want to track you then "they" already know your banking info and attendant RFID signatures, vehicle profile and numbers, list of known or possible associates, etc..
If you were THAT big a question mark to "them", "they" would already be at your d
Really, if some ominous "they" want to track you then "they" already know your banking info and attendant RFID signatures, vehicle profile and numbers, list of known or possible associates, etc..
This is true, but there are other issues to consider with this.
For example, one of the things that is legal in the United States is for the police to follow you around throughout your day, seeing where you go, who you talk to, when you scratch your butt walking down the street. There's plkenty of case law supporting
This would be good for people wanting to let their friends know where they are or for parents wanting to know where their children are at all times.
What it really means: This would be good for girlfriends wanting to know where their boyfriends are or for parents wanting to know where their children are at all times.
We didn't even have cell phones when I was a teeneger. Of course, there were no child molesters or terrorists. All we had to fear was Russia throwing nukes at us.
Yes, there were probably as many pederasts as today, and anyone in Great Britain knows there were terrorists then, but the media didn't hype them like they do today. I'd bet kids are SAFER now than we were then, but you wouldn't know it from the mainstream media.
I watched the preview and it shows a woman arguing that there is an equal chance of being struck by lightning as being kidnapped (non-family). A little research shows that:
* You have a 1 in 560 chance [kidsfightingchance.com] of being kidnapped by a non-family member and of those 1/5 will be murdered.
* You have a 1 in 280,000 [lightningsafety.com] chance of being struck by lightning.
* You have a 1 in 100 [answers.com] chance of dying in a car accident.
While the lady in the video was grossly overestimating the chances of being struck by lightning, there may not be much cause to freak your kids out about "stranger danger". They need to know the information and how to protect themselves, but they definitely shouldn't be made to be hermits and more than they shouldn't be prevented from riding in cars.
One thing is for sure, though. Don't get your statistics from Penn and Teller videos.
From your link on kidsfightingchance, I was able to calculate: 11.4 out of 1000 kids are reported missing each year, which comes out to about 800000 cases. Of those, 69000 are actually abducted. Of those, 18% are by non-family. Of those, 37% are by non-friends. The way I crunch the numbers...
11.4/1000 * 69/800*.18 *.37 = 0.0000654
Or,about 1 in 15000 chance of being abducted by a stranger. Even if you go non-family only, it's only about 1 per 10000... Where did you get 1 in 560??
Granted, it's nowhere near the remoteness of a lightning strike, but the odds of an abduction by a non-family member are remote at best.
Nor should you get your statistics from websites that, on the very same page, list conflicting data:
Of the 800,000 children reported missing annually, approximately 69,000 are abducted: Family members account for the majority of these reported cases (82 percent) Non-family abductions account for 12,000 of these reported cases (18 percent)
Farther down on the same page:
Each year 3,600 to 4,200 children are abducted by someone outside the family; 1/2 of them are age 12 or older; 2/3 are female; at least 19% of these abductors are not strangers to their victims-Finklehor, p. 10. *The chance of a minor being kidnapped by a stranger is 1 in 560, by a family member 1 in 180. - Discover Magazine as reported by Gannett News Service 5/28/96.
Now, if you take that 12,000 number, multiply it by 18 (years of childhood), and then take that result (216,000) and determine the percentage that represents of the child population in the US (82,457,018... I grabbed a number off the Census website that's for the 2007 American Community survey, but I had to total up percentages of population by age group and then take that percentage of the total population), you get about a.26% chance of being kidnapped by a stranger... but 1 in 560 is more like.17%. And the ratio of those two percentages don't match the annual statistics, where one lists a number that's 3-4 times as high as the other. Notice that the much higher number is listed prominently at the top of the page, without a footnote as to the conflicting measures from other sources.
Yep! Google confirms it. Since my mother is 60, I appreciate you paying attention to her. And even though she considers you to be only a small appetizer, you do keep her from calling me for about 3 minutes.
Oh man, I hope my girlfriend gets on this! It will make it SO much easier to track her. I am so sick of hiding in the bushes across the street from her house for three hours just to find out she wasn't even home! And this is going to save me a fortune on text messages...I won't need to text her every 3 minutes asking where she is if I have Google Maps to tell me!
Seriously, this is going to revolutionize our relationship. I know we're going to be so happy with this new tracking technology! The restraining order says no, but your Google Maps icon says yes!
Oh man, I hope my girlfriend gets on this! It will make it SO much easier to track her.
Funny, but you raise an important point... This could be used by abusive spouses to keep tabs on the other person, particularly because there doesn't seem to be a "keep my location here no matter where I go" - so turning it off or setting it to the city-location mode could trigger angry accusations.
Does anyone see the irony in allowing a 3rd party to keep sophisticated data on your and your friends' whereabouts? Given the government's predilection for snooping [wikipedia.org] and the current lack of openness [metagovernment.org] in government, it seems somewhat frightening to allow even the overly-beloved Google this sort of power over your friends.
I'm not sure about the irony, but for $15/week, I'll feed and care for your phone, take it everywhere with me. I even promise not to take it to any meetings of subversive groups, or atheist meetups.
The government will be happy that you are an active social part of society, and you can rest assured that your privacy is perfectly secure.
In fact, your tracking data will look exactly like that of 17 other lucky folks who have signed up before all the openings are gone. I just have one space left, so hurry. If you call in the next 10 minutes, you'll also receive photo frame skin for your other phone that holds a picture of the tracked phone so that you'll never miss it, normally a $29.99 value, but you'll get it absolutely free.
Sign up now, hurry, available spots are going fast.
when I get a phone call or text message from my wife, I have to drive back to work before answering it and giving her my location? Awesome. The bar won't be happy:-)
There are many applications that do this for people already. I would rather go out of my way to turn this functionality on, rather than go out of my way to turn it off.
1) Where does it say that this is in any way, an opt out feature? 2) What does Prior Art have to do with anything? The article isn't 'Google patents putting dots on map' its 'Google is implementing such and such a feature'.
Google claims that the tracking client has the ability to lie--that is, report your location as an address you type in. Problem is, if your boss is tracking you to an address, he'll know you're lying because you instantly appear at the destination.
.
So the first thing we need is a google application that can update this "lie" info in real time. I want to type in a start address, an end address and have it automatically update the lie with intermediate locations that correspond to a realistic speed. Then even if your boss is watching you, it'll look like you are following instructions (even though you are at the bar).
That way, when it is inevitably used by assholes, we can salute and chime "Sure thing, boss!" then ignore him with impunity.
I think you are trying to show that my script idea would be bad because it could be used against me. And then I couldn't rely on google maps to track my wife. However, if you think I believe having the ability to track my wife is a good thing (or, indeed, anybody being able to track anybody), you are wrong. In fact, wanting that ability is surely the sign of some mental defect.
This company is beginning to honestly frighten me. I was a fan when they were an up & coming search engine, but I started to get concerned about the near monopoly they're getting in search... and the tentacles are spreading. Gmail, Google Maps, AdSense, Android, Analytics... now this crap? I think it's time for me to begin using alternatives.
I find it odd that it'll work on Blackberries and other phones, but not the G1 phones yet. Must have been something that's been in the works for a while and they haven't had time to rework it for the G1.
The G1 actually already has an app (on the market, Locales I think it is) that will watch your location and enable and disable features on the phone. I use it to set my phone on vibrate at work automatically, and turn it back on afterwards. It turns my Wifi on at home and off everywhere else.
It shouldn't be too hard to make another app that replicates the 'friend gps tracking' functionality on the G1. And if you lose your phone, you know where it was last time it was on.:D
There is alot of people who will just love this. We all know the type. They are the same type who change their facebook status 50 times a day, and twitter about every stupid thing they do. The ones that think everyone cares they are catching a bus to the grocery store, or getting off said bus, or debating what type of juice to buy at grocery store, or almost done shopping at grocery store or... no I still don't fucking care.
Alot of people don't want privacy, they want the opposite, and they will love this.
The old "parents wanting to know where their children are" trick!
It wouldn't surprise me if media suddenly start to emphatize missing child cases...
What would you be teaching to your kid if you did that? Only that it is OK for an authority to know where they are/what they do, anytime... You'd be stripping away their right to privacy before they realize how important it is. If I need to hear from him, I'll just call him.
Sadly I think most of today's generation has forgotten why 1984 is scary. Especially if you wrap it up in pretty colors and throw a 2.0 and a medallion that says "BETA" on it.
Except on Slashdot, where 1984 has to be referenced regardless of whether or not it's applicable. (For the record, I don't recall it being the case in 1984 that the whereabouts of citizens were tracked at all times.)
I'm not entirely sure what the concern is here? Is grandparent poster thinking that the government will be circumventing the requirement that people enable the "Track Me" service? That Google will allow them access to or retain the data contrary to their policies? (That at least seems more likel
See, I would recommend actually reading 1984, rather than quoting a single line from it and saying, "Seems to me...".
Let's see:
Original claim - 1984 didn't advocate tracking the whereabouts of the citizens at all times. Single line quote - refutes claim.
More proof (contained in the link [liferesear...versal.com])
"The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously. Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would be picked up by it, moreover, so long as he remained within the field of vision which the metal plaque commanded, he could be seen as well as heard. There was of course no way of knowing whether you were being watched at any given moment. How often, or on what system, the Thought Police plugged in on any individual wire was guesswork. It was even conceivable that they watched everybody all the time. "
Can I have my location copywritten? I want NO ONE to have access or the right to use my location in any manner without my explicit approval. Feds and local law enforcement included.
"Copywritten" is the past participle of "copywrite", a verb meaning to compose text for an advertisement [wikipedia.org]. This has nothing to do with "copyright", a verb meaning to secure exclusive rights in a work of authorship. Besides, your location isn't a work of authorship, so you can't copyright it either.
That said, local privacy law may give you some rights to exclude use of your location. Case law in the United States, for one, recognizes privacy rights based on the Fourth and Fifth Amendments. But still, based
No, if you're really paranoid you DON'T CARRY A CELL PHONE IN THE FIRST PLACE. Think about it: if you don't have a phone, you can't be tracked through it, period.
Don't need it (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Don't need it (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Six degrees of separation game (Score:4, Insightful)
"if you were tracking your best friend" ... and in time, if most people tracked their best friends (and family), then Google would literally have the power of Big Brother to monitor the movements of almost everyone. Sounds exactly like they want to play the six degrees of separation game.
This also sounds like a dream come true for the world's governments (who do get data from Google). (Plus even if it just grew over a few years until it was say 10% of the population they tracked, there is huge statistical value in approximating the movements of that many people).
But anyone signing up to this or signing up their friends better be careful they don't visit any part of a city while a government protest is going on (or even visit the home of someone who was at a government protest, or even visit someone who was friends with someone who was at a protest).
People in power get into power because they seek power over others and they are constantly seeking ways to gain power and influence over others. (Their greatest fear is the loss of power and they spend sometimes decades learning how to gain power and influence over others). The simply act of seeking power over someone else is to seek to dictate terms to that person. That is why democracy is constantly undermined and why democracy has to be defended by each generation. Just because we have democracy now doesn't mean we keep democracy as there are people who seek to undermine it for their own gain. Ironically it is the very nature of seeking power over others that undermines democracy. So they end up distorting the society they control out of all proportion until their minority in power can control, manipulate and dictate whatever they want for their own gain.
People in power don't care about individuals but they do care about controlling and manipulating groups of people (as groups of people can stand against governments points of view). But before they can manipulate and influence a group, they need to profile everyone into groups, to then know how and where best to apply their influence. Ultimately they wish to play a divide and conquer game to undermine any group which can stand in the way of their goals. So they end up continuing to bias laws and controls in their favor, until the society they control is a nightmare vision for the majority of people in their control.
Knowledge is power and this new move by Google is a level of power way beyond the capabilities of any government in history. If the majority of people fail to learn from the mistakes of the past, we are all doomed to repeat the mistakes of the past. Knowledge is power and people who seek power see a book like 1984 as something that is good, as they are the ones who seek to control and use that level of power over others for their own gain. The people who seek such power never see their own actions as wrong, as they are too busy seeking power over others and ignoring anyone who suggests they cannot have ever more power.
We all need to stand up and speak out against moves like this before the level of control is so great that no one can speak out, for fear of what the people in power will be able to do to anyone standing up and speaking out. Democracy has to be defended by each generation and the more this level of power grows, the more we are all going to be forced by their actions to stand up and speak out against the ones who seek such power over everyone.
Parent
Re:Six degrees of separation game (Score:4, Funny)
...it could just be that Google can see the increase hits inherent in this plan, and therefore the increased ad revenue.
And if they happen to deliver an ad (for 50 cents off, mayhap) to you for the doughnut shop you are walking past, well that's just frosting (or glaze... or SPRINKLES, ahhhhh) on the cake of life.
Really, if some ominous "they" want to track you then "they" already know your banking info and attendant RFID signatures, vehicle profile and numbers, list of known or possible associates, etc..
If you were THAT big a question mark to "them", "they" would already be at your d
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
This is true, but there are other issues to consider with this.
For example, one of the things that is legal in the United States is for the police to follow you around throughout your day, seeing where you go, who you talk to, when you scratch your butt walking down the street. There's plkenty of case law supporting
I don't think it means what they think it means... (Score:4, Insightful)
How the article reads:
What it really means:
This would be good for girlfriends wanting to know where their boyfriends are or for parents wanting to know where their children are at all times.
Re:I don't think it means what they think it means (Score:5, Funny)
Parent
Or stopped being lovers ... (Score:3, Insightful)
The women who know where their men are are called widows.
Or stopped being lovers when they became wives.
My generation was lucky (Score:5, Insightful)
We didn't even have cell phones when I was a teeneger. Of course, there were no child molesters or terrorists. All we had to fear was Russia throwing nukes at us.
Yes, there were probably as many pederasts as today, and anyone in Great Britain knows there were terrorists then, but the media didn't hype them like they do today. I'd bet kids are SAFER now than we were then, but you wouldn't know it from the mainstream media.
Parent
Re:My generation was lucky (Score:5, Informative)
I'd bet kids are SAFER now than we were then
You're very right. [sho.com]
Parent
Re:My generation was lucky (Score:5, Informative)
* You have a 1 in 560 chance [kidsfightingchance.com] of being kidnapped by a non-family member and of those 1/5 will be murdered.
* You have a 1 in 280,000 [lightningsafety.com] chance of being struck by lightning.
* You have a 1 in 100 [answers.com] chance of dying in a car accident.
While the lady in the video was grossly overestimating the chances of being struck by lightning, there may not be much cause to freak your kids out about "stranger danger". They need to know the information and how to protect themselves, but they definitely shouldn't be made to be hermits and more than they shouldn't be prevented from riding in cars.
One thing is for sure, though. Don't get your statistics from Penn and Teller videos.
Parent
Re:My generation was lucky (Score:5, Informative)
11.4/1000 * 69/800*
Or,about 1 in 15000 chance of being abducted by a stranger. Even if you go non-family only, it's only about 1 per 10000... Where did you get 1 in 560?? Granted, it's nowhere near the remoteness of a lightning strike, but the odds of an abduction by a non-family member are remote at best.
Parent
Re:My generation was lucky (Score:5, Insightful)
Nor should you get your statistics from websites that, on the very same page, list conflicting data:
Of the 800,000 children reported missing annually, approximately 69,000 are abducted:
Family members account for the majority of these reported cases (82 percent)
Non-family abductions account for 12,000 of these reported cases (18 percent)
Farther down on the same page:
Each year 3,600 to 4,200 children are abducted by someone outside the family; 1/2 of them are age 12 or older; 2/3 are female; at least 19% of these abductors are not strangers to their victims-Finklehor, p. 10. *The chance of a minor being kidnapped by a stranger is 1 in 560, by a family member 1 in 180. - Discover Magazine as reported by Gannett News Service 5/28/96.
Now, if you take that 12,000 number, multiply it by 18 (years of childhood), and then take that result (216,000) and determine the percentage that represents of the child population in the US (82,457,018... I grabbed a number off the Census website that's for the 2007 American Community survey, but I had to total up percentages of population by age group and then take that percentage of the total population), you get about a .26% chance of being kidnapped by a stranger... but 1 in 560 is more like .17%. And the ratio of those two percentages don't match the annual statistics, where one lists a number that's 3-4 times as high as the other. Notice that the much higher number is listed prominently at the top of the page, without a footnote as to the conflicting measures from other sources.
Parent
Re:My generation was lucky (Score:5, Funny)
You might want to finish reading the comment before you... HEY! PAY ATTENTION!
Parent
Re:I don't think it means what they think it means (Score:4, Insightful)
This would be good for girlfriends wanting to know where their boyfriends are or for parents wanting to know where their children are at all times.
Because we ALL know there are no obsessive, jealous, and insecure males of the species, right?
Parent
Re:I don't think it means what they think it means (Score:5, Funny)
Current location:
Your mom.
Yep! Google confirms it. Since my mother is 60, I appreciate you paying attention to her. And even though she considers you to be only a small appetizer, you do keep her from calling me for about 3 minutes.
Parent
So, kind of like Britekite? (Score:4, Interesting)
Sounds remarkably similar to the services offered by Brightkite [brightkite.com].
Re:So, kind of like Britekite? (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re:So, kind of like Britekite? (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re:So, kind of like Britekite? (Score:5, Funny)
No guys! This is GOOGLE! It's new and innovative!!
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
And Heroes! [heroesfanatic.com]
The Classics (Score:4, Funny)
"You are standing in an open field west of a white house, with a boarded front door. There is a mailbox here."
Parent
Sweet! (Score:5, Funny)
Oh man, I hope my girlfriend gets on this! It will make it SO much easier to track her. I am so sick of hiding in the bushes across the street from her house for three hours just to find out she wasn't even home! And this is going to save me a fortune on text messages...I won't need to text her every 3 minutes asking where she is if I have Google Maps to tell me!
Seriously, this is going to revolutionize our relationship. I know we're going to be so happy with this new tracking technology! The restraining order says no, but your Google Maps icon says yes!
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Oh man, I hope my girlfriend gets on this! It will make it SO much easier to track her.
Funny, but you raise an important point... This could be used by abusive spouses to keep tabs on the other person, particularly because there doesn't seem to be a "keep my location here no matter where I go" - so turning it off or setting it to the city-location mode could trigger angry accusations.
Re:Sweet! (Score:4, Insightful)
Because clearly there wouldn't have been any pre-existing problems in such a relationship.
It's like Science Fiction. It's not really about the technology; the tech just provides an interesting framework to examine the real issues.
Parent
Abuse (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Abuse (Score:5, Interesting)
I'm not sure about the irony, but for $15/week, I'll feed and care for your phone, take it everywhere with me. I even promise not to take it to any meetings of subversive groups, or atheist meetups.
The government will be happy that you are an active social part of society, and you can rest assured that your privacy is perfectly secure.
In fact, your tracking data will look exactly like that of 17 other lucky folks who have signed up before all the openings are gone. I just have one space left, so hurry. If you call in the next 10 minutes, you'll also receive photo frame skin for your other phone that holds a picture of the tracked phone so that you'll never miss it, normally a $29.99 value, but you'll get it absolutely free.
Sign up now, hurry, available spots are going fast.
Parent
So that means (Score:5, Funny)
wife's location? (Score:5, Funny)
As long as my wife doesn't use it to track my girlfriend. Then I'd be really f00ked.
My hobby (Score:2, Funny)
Prior Art (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Prior Art (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
1) Where does it say that this is in any way, an opt out feature?
2) What does Prior Art have to do with anything? The article isn't 'Google patents putting dots on map' its 'Google is implementing such and such a feature'.
Foe Tracking (Score:3, Funny)
Who needs friend tracking? What we need is Foe Tracking (tm).
They claim you can lie (Score:5, Interesting)
.
So the first thing we need is a google application that can update this "lie" info in real time. I want to type in a start address, an end address and have it automatically update the lie with intermediate locations that correspond to a realistic speed. Then even if your boss is watching you, it'll look like you are following instructions (even though you are at the bar).
That way, when it is inevitably used by assholes, we can salute and chime "Sure thing, boss!" then ignore him with impunity.
A perfect example (Score:3, Insightful)
Google sucks (Score:4, Insightful)
G1! No! (Score:4, Interesting)
I find it odd that it'll work on Blackberries and other phones, but not the G1 phones yet. Must have been something that's been in the works for a while and they haven't had time to rework it for the G1.
The G1 actually already has an app (on the market, Locales I think it is) that will watch your location and enable and disable features on the phone. I use it to set my phone on vibrate at work automatically, and turn it back on afterwards. It turns my Wifi on at home and off everywhere else.
It shouldn't be too hard to make another app that replicates the 'friend gps tracking' functionality on the G1. And if you lose your phone, you know where it was last time it was on. :D
Thank God They Didn't Have This Way Back When (Score:3, Funny)
I doubt my parents would have been happy to discover I was in the Downtowner buying cigarettes instead of third period social studies. . .
APRS (Score:4, Informative)
It saddens me that none of you have mentioned APRS [aprs.fi]. It's a long-standing and open protocol for doing positions reporting.
Slashdot needs more HAMs. ~KB1PNB
Sounds Great For Attention Whores (Score:4, Funny)
Alot of people don't want privacy, they want the opposite, and they will love this.
The old trick (Score:4, Insightful)
The old "parents wanting to know where their children are" trick!
It wouldn't surprise me if media suddenly start to emphatize missing child cases...
What would you be teaching to your kid if you did that? Only that it is OK for an authority to know where they are/what they do, anytime... You'd be stripping away their right to privacy before they realize how important it is.
If I need to hear from him, I'll just call him.
Re:Big brother knows where you are (Score:5, Insightful)
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Except on Slashdot, where 1984 has to be referenced regardless of whether or not it's applicable. (For the record, I don't recall it being the case in 1984 that the whereabouts of citizens were tracked at all times.)
I'm not entirely sure what the concern is here? Is grandparent poster thinking that the government will be circumventing the requirement that people enable the "Track Me" service? That Google will allow them access to or retain the data contrary to their policies? (That at least seems more likel
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
See, I would recommend actually reading 1984, rather than quoting a single line from it and saying, "Seems to me...".
Re:Big brother knows where you are (Score:5, Informative)
See, I would recommend actually reading 1984, rather than quoting a single line from it and saying, "Seems to me...".
Let's see:
Original claim - 1984 didn't advocate tracking the whereabouts of the citizens at all times.
Single line quote - refutes claim.
More proof (contained in the link [liferesear...versal.com])
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Can I have my location copywritten?
Well, you can write a copy of your location but you can't have it copyrighted any more than you can copyright your phone number. So, no. Sorry.
Can't copywrite OR copyright a location, but... (Score:3, Funny)
Can I have my location copywritten? I want NO ONE to have access or the right to use my location in any manner without my explicit approval. Feds and local law enforcement included.
"Copywritten" is the past participle of "copywrite", a verb meaning to compose text for an advertisement [wikipedia.org]. This has nothing to do with "copyright", a verb meaning to secure exclusive rights in a work of authorship. Besides, your location isn't a work of authorship, so you can't copyright it either.
That said, local privacy law may give you some rights to exclude use of your location. Case law in the United States, for one, recognizes privacy rights based on the Fourth and Fifth Amendments. But still, based
Re:Turn off your phone... (Score:5, Insightful)
No, if you're really paranoid you DON'T CARRY A CELL PHONE IN THE FIRST PLACE. Think about it: if you don't have a phone, you can't be tracked through it, period.
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